A Yorkshire Tragedy

Shakespeare (spurious and doubtful works), 1564-16Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.4

Word count: 42K words
Chapters: 5

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.A Yorkshire Tragedy by ShakespeareAuthor: Shakespeare (spurious and doubtful works), 1564-1616,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Jul 1, 2003

Editor's review

A Yorkshire Tragedy is a short early modern English play classed among Shakespeare's doubtful works. Drawn from a family tragedy, it is somber in tone and centers on sin, domestic breakdown, and moral retribution. Its value lies not in settling the authorship question but in its being a typical case for observing seventeenth-century English theatrical production and attribution: how the text circulated, why it was tied to Shakespeare's name, and how editors and scholars distinguish authentic from spurious works—these questions reveal more about how early modern drama operated than the play itself. As a short play, it is tightly paced with concentrated conflict, making it useful introductory material for the period's domestic tragedy and moral drama traditions. Readers expecting a forgotten Shakespeare masterpiece may be disappointed; those willing to place it in the context of textual scholarship and theatrical history will find much to ponder.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers studying Shakespeare attribution and early modern dramatic texts
Those interested in seventeenth-century English domestic tragedy and moral drama traditions
Students of English literature encountering Shakespeare's doubtful works
Drama enthusiasts who enjoy short plays and textual transmission questions

Not a good fit for

Readers seeking only canonical Shakespeare and uninterested in authenticity debates
Deep drama readers expecting complex characterization and intricate plotting
General readers impatient with early modern English texts and textual scholarship

Reading tips

Read the play first, then consult introductions or scholarship on the attribution debate to form your own judgment
Note the moralizing and domestic relationships, reading alongside contemporary domestic tragedies
Treat it as a case in textual scholarship rather than a classic, focusing on how editors handle authorship
If the English is difficult, use a modern translation or plot summary to get oriented first

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this play really by Shakespeare?

It is classed among Shakespeare's doubtful works, and its attribution has long been disputed. The source labels it spurious and doubtful; readers should treat it as a case study in attribution rather than a confirmed Shakespeare play and consult textual scholarship for a specific judgment.

How long is the play, and how hard is it to read?

It is a short play with concentrated action, easier going than the long Shakespeare plays. But the text is early modern English, distant from today's language; beginners can use introductions, notes, or plot summaries to ease the difficulty.

Why read a play of doubtful authorship?

Its value lies in showing how early modern drama was copied, published, and attributed, and how scholars distinguish authentic from spurious works. For those studying the formation of the Shakespeare canon and theatrical history, such texts often illuminate more than the acknowledged masterpieces.

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About the author

Shakespeare (spurious and doubtful works), 1564-16 Author

Shakespeare (spurious and doubtful works), 1564-16, is a designation for a special category of texts: plays traditionally attributed to Shakespeare but of doubtful or disputed authorship. Ten such works are held here, including King Edward III, A Yorkshire Tragedy, The Two Noble Kinsmen, Sir Thomas More, The Merry Devil of Edmonton, and The Life and Death of the Lord Cromwell. Their subjects range from English chronicle history to family tragedy and citizen comedy; many were written with other dramatists of the period or revised by later hands. Their style has points of contact with the accepted Shakespeare canon while bearing clear marks of their age. Scholarship on these plays has long advanced the debate over the Shakespeare canon and the history of early modern English drama. Given the limited public record, the author's life and the exact attribution of these works cannot be set out in detail.